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Spy Game

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Spy Game
Spy Game poster.jpg
Theatrical release poster
Directed byTony Scott
Screenplay by
Story byMichael Frost Beckner
Produced by
Starring
CinematographyDan Mindel
Edited byChristian Wagner
Music byHarry Gregson-Williams
Production
companies
Distributed by
Release date
  • November 21, 2001 (2001-11-21) (United States)
Running time
126 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$115 million[3]
Box office$143 million

Spy Game is a 2001 American action thriller film directed by Tony Scott and starring Robert Redford and Brad Pitt. The film grossed $62 million in the United States and $143 million worldwide on a $115 million budget, and received mostly positive reviews from film critics.

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Action film

Action film

Action film is a film genre in which the protagonist is thrust into a series of events that typically involve violence and physical feats. The genre tends to feature a mostly resourceful hero struggling against incredible odds, which include life-threatening situations, a dangerous villain, or a pursuit which usually concludes in victory for the hero.

Thriller film

Thriller film

Thriller film, also known as suspense film or suspense thriller, is a broad film genre that evokes excitement and suspense in the audience. The suspense element found in most films' plots is particularly exploited by the filmmaker in this genre. Tension is created by delaying what the audience sees as inevitable, and is built through situations that are menacing or where escape seems impossible.

Film

Film

A film – also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick – is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmosphere through the use of moving images. These images are generally accompanied by sound and, more rarely, other sensory stimulations. The word "cinema", short for cinematography, is often used to refer to filmmaking and the film industry, and to the art form that is the result of it.

Tony Scott

Tony Scott

Anthony David Leighton Scott was an English film director and producer. He was known for directing highly successful action and thriller films such as Top Gun (1986), Beverly Hills Cop II (1987), Days of Thunder (1990), The Last Boy Scout (1991), True Romance (1993), Crimson Tide (1995), Enemy of the State (1998), Man on Fire (2004), Déjà Vu (2006), and Unstoppable (2010).

Robert Redford

Robert Redford

Charles Robert Redford Jr. is an American actor and filmmaker. He is the recipient of various accolades, including an Academy Award from four nominations, a British Academy Film Award, two Golden Globe Awards, the Cecil B. DeMille Award and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. In 2014, Time named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world.

Brad Pitt

Brad Pitt

William Bradley Pitt is an American actor and film producer. He is the recipient of various accolades, including two Academy Awards, two British Academy Film Awards, two Golden Globe Awards, and a Primetime Emmy Award. As a public figure, Pitt has been cited as one of the most powerful and influential people in the American entertainment industry.

Plot

In 1991, the United States and China are close to a major trade agreement, with the President due to visit China to seal the deal. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) learns that its asset Tom Bishop has been arrested at a People's Liberation Army prison in Suzhou and will be executed in 24 hours, unless the U.S. government claims him and bargains for his release. Bishop's actions, unsanctioned by the CIA, risk jeopardizing the agreement. A group of CIA executives summon Nathan D. Muir, a veteran case officer and Bishop's mentor, who plans to retire from the Agency at the end of the day. While purportedly interviewing Muir to learn his history with Bishop, the executives seek a pretext for not intervening on Bishop's imprisonment. Unknown to them, Muir was tipped off about Bishop's capture by fellow CIA veteran Harry Duncan in Hong Kong.

Muir leaks the story to CNN through an MI6 contact, Digby 'Digger' Gibson in Hong Kong, believing that public pressure would force American intervention. They are stalled briefly before a phone call to the FCC from Deputy Director for Operations Charles Harker results in CNN retracting the story as a hoax. Muir met Bishop in 1975, when Bishop was a United States Marine Corps Scout Sniper during the Vietnam War. Muir gives Bishop a mission to eliminate a high-ranking North Vietnamese military officer. Bishop and his spotter Tran are able to assassinate the target despite being compromised, though Bishop takes out a pursuing enemy attack chopper. Bishop escorts the now wounded Tran to safety, impressing Muir. In 1976, Muir recruited Bishop as a CIA asset in Berlin, where Bishop was tasked with procuring assets in East Germany. Then he discusses Bishop's spy work in Beirut in 1985, during the War of the Camps, which was their last mission together.

In a series of flashbacks, Bishop is troubled by Muir's conviction that civilian "assets" who endangered a mission should be sacrificed to preserve the "greater good." After Bishop attempts to countermand Muir during a mission to save the life of an asset, Muir emphasizes that he will not tolerate dissent, and would not rescue Bishop if he was captured going "off the reservation". During a mission in Lebanon, Bishop, posing as a photojournalist, meets relief worker Elizabeth Hadley. While using her to connect with an asset for the mission, they became romantically involved. Muir distrusts Hadley, and reveals to Bishop that she was exiled from the United Kingdom. Hadley later confesses to Bishop that she was involved in the bombing of a Chinese building in Britain, which was supposed to be empty but contained Chinese nationals. Bishop reveals to Hadley his true identity. Muir elects again to sacrifice a civilian asset for the sake of their mission, and Bishop cuts professional ties with Muir. Muir, fearing that Hadley could threaten the Agency and potentially Bishop, makes a deal with the Chinese, exchanging Hadley in return for an arrested U.S. diplomat. Chinese agents kidnap Hadley, and a Dear John letter is forged and left for Bishop.

In the present, Muir realizes that Bishop went to China for Hadley. In a series of misdirections, he forges a directive signed by the Director of Central Intelligence to begin "Operation Dinner Out", a rescue mission spearheaded by a SEAL team that Bishop had developed as a "Plan B" for his own attempt at rescuing Hadley. Using $282,000 of his life savings and a misappropriated file on Chinese coastline satellite imagery, Muir enlists Duncan to assist him in bribing a Chinese energy official to cut power to the prison for 30 minutes, during which time the SEAL rescue team will retrieve Bishop and Hadley. Harker is suspicious that Muir is working against the CIA, but when he confronts Muir before the gathered executives, Muir "confesses" to unprofessionally using company resources to gather information about his intended retirement home, which he has distorted the evidence to support. Bishop is rescued along with Hadley, and surmises that Muir was responsible for saving him when he hears the helicopter pilot refer to "Operation Dinner Out", which was also the code name for an operation Bishop used to get a birthday gift for Muir while they were in Lebanon. When the CIA officials are belatedly informed of the rescue, Muir has already left the building and is seen driving safely off into the countryside.

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China

China

China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and borders fourteen countries by land, the most of any country in the world, tied with Russia. With an area of approximately 9.6 million square kilometres (3,700,000 sq mi), it is the world's third largest country by total land area. The country consists of 22 provinces, five autonomous regions, four municipalities, and two special administrative regions. The national capital is Beijing, and the most populous city and largest financial center is Shanghai.

President of the United States

President of the United States

The president of the United States (POTUS) is the head of state and head of government of the United States of America. The president directs the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces.

Central Intelligence Agency

Central Intelligence Agency

The Central Intelligence Agency, known informally as the Agency and historically as the company, is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gathering, processing, and analyzing national security information from around the world, primarily through the use of human intelligence (HUMINT) and conducting covert action. As a principal member of the United States Intelligence Community (IC), the CIA reports to the Director of National Intelligence and is primarily focused on providing intelligence for the President and Cabinet of the United States. Following the dissolution of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) at the end of World War II, President Harry S. Truman created the Central Intelligence Group under the direction of a Director of Central Intelligence by presidential directive on January 22, 1946, and this group was transformed into the Central Intelligence Agency by implementation of the National Security Act of 1947.

People's Liberation Army

People's Liberation Army

The People's Liberation Army (PLA) is the principal military force of the People's Republic of China and the armed wing of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The PLA consists of five service branches: the Ground Force, Navy, Air Force, Rocket Force, and Strategic Support Force. It is under the leadership of the Central Military Commission (CMC) with its chairman as commander-in-chief.

Suzhou

Suzhou

Suzhou, alternately romanized as Soochow, is a major city in southern Jiangsu province, East China. Suzhou is the most populous city in Jiangsu, and a major economic center and focal point of trade and commerce.

Federal government of the United States

Federal government of the United States

The federal government of the United States is the national government of the United States, a federal republic located primarily in North America, composed of 50 states, a city within a federal district, five major self-governing territories and several island possessions. The federal government, sometimes simply referred to as Washington, is composed of three distinct branches: legislative, executive, and judicial, whose powers are vested by the U.S. Constitution in the Congress, the president and the federal courts, respectively. The powers and duties of these branches are further defined by acts of Congress, including the creation of executive departments and courts inferior to the Supreme Court.

Hong Kong

Hong Kong

Hong Kong, officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta in South China. With 7.5 million residents of various nationalities in a 1,104-square-kilometre (426 sq mi) territory, Hong Kong is one of the most densely populated places in the world. Hong Kong is also a major global financial centre and one of the most developed cities in the world.

CNN

CNN

CNN is a multinational news channel and website headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable news channel, and presently owned by the Manhattan-based media conglomerate Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD), CNN was the first television channel to provide 24-hour news coverage and the first all-news television channel in the United States.

Federal Communications Commission

Federal Communications Commission

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisdiction over the areas of broadband access, fair competition, radio frequency use, media responsibility, public safety, and homeland security.

Deputy Director of CIA for Operations

Deputy Director of CIA for Operations

The deputy director of the CIA for operations is a senior United States government official in the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency who serves as head of the Directorate of Operations. The position was established December 1, 1950 and from January 4, 1951, until March 1, 1973, it was known as Deputy Director of Plans (DDP). When this unit was known as the Directorate of Plans, it at first accounted for about 75% of the CIA budget and about 60% of the personnel within the CIA.

People's Army of Vietnam

People's Army of Vietnam

The People's Army of Vietnam, or the Vietnam People's Army (VPA), also informally recognized as the Vietnamese Army or the People's Army, is the military force of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam and the armed wing of the ruling Communist Party of Vietnam. The PAVN is a part of the Vietnam People's Armed Forces and includes: Ground Force, Navy, Air Force, Border Guard and Coast Guard. However, Vietnam does not have a separate Ground Force or Army branch. All ground troops, army corps, military districts and specialised arms belong to the Ministry of National Defence, directly under the command of the Central Military Commission, the Minister of Defence, and the General Staff of the Vietnam People's Army. The military flag of the PAVN is the flag of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, with the words Quyết thắng added in yellow at the top left.

East Germany

East Germany

East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic, was a country in Central Europe that existed from its creation on 7 October 1949 until its dissolution on 3 October 1990. Until 1989, this country was commonly viewed as a communist state, and it described itself as a socialist "workers' and peasants' state". Before the establishment, its territory was administered and occupied by Soviet forces with the autonomy of the native communists following the Berlin Declaration abolishing German sovereignty in World War II; when the Potsdam Agreement established the Soviet-occupied zone, bounded on the east by the Oder–Neisse line. GDR was dominated by the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) from 1949 to 1989 before being liberalized under the impact of the Revolutions of 1989 against the communist states, helping East Germany be united with the West. Unlike West Germany, SED did not see its state as the successor one of the German Reich (1871–1945) and abolished the goal of unification in the constitution (1974). Under the SED rule, GDR was often judged as a Soviet satellite state, most scholars and academics described it as a totalitarian regime.

Cast

Discover more about Cast related topics

Brad Pitt

Brad Pitt

William Bradley Pitt is an American actor and film producer. He is the recipient of various accolades, including two Academy Awards, two British Academy Film Awards, two Golden Globe Awards, and a Primetime Emmy Award. As a public figure, Pitt has been cited as one of the most powerful and influential people in the American entertainment industry.

Catherine McCormack

Catherine McCormack

Catherine Jane McCormack is an English actress of stage and screen. Her film appearances include Braveheart (1995), The Land Girls (1998), Dangerous Beauty (1998), Dancing at Lughnasa (1998), Spy Game (2001), and 28 Weeks Later (2007). Her theatre work includes National Theatre productions of All My Sons (2000) and Honour (2003).

Deputy Director of CIA for Operations

Deputy Director of CIA for Operations

The deputy director of the CIA for operations is a senior United States government official in the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency who serves as head of the Directorate of Operations. The position was established December 1, 1950 and from January 4, 1951, until March 1, 1973, it was known as Deputy Director of Plans (DDP). When this unit was known as the Directorate of Plans, it at first accounted for about 75% of the CIA budget and about 60% of the personnel within the CIA.

Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency

Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency

The Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (DD/CIA) is a statutory office and the second-highest official of the Central Intelligence Agency. The DD/CIA assists the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (D/CIA) and is authorized to exercise the powers of the D/CIA when the Director's position is vacant or in the Director's absence or disability.

Ken Leung

Ken Leung

Kenneth Leung is an American actor. His roles include Sang in Rush Hour, Miles Straume in Lost, Admiral Statura in Star Wars: The Force Awakens, and Eric Tao in HBO's Industry.

David Hemmings

David Hemmings

David Edward Leslie Hemmings was an English actor and director. He is best remembered for his roles in British films and television programmes of the 1960s and 1970s, particularly his lead role as a trendy fashion photographer in the hugely successful avant-garde mystery film Blowup (1966), directed by Michelangelo Antonioni. Early in his career, Hemmings was a boy soprano appearing in operatic roles. In 1967, he co-founded the Hemdale Film Corporation. From the mid-1970s on, he worked mainly as a character actor and occasionally as director.

Garrick Hagon

Garrick Hagon

Garrick Hagon is a British-Canadian actor in film, stage, television and radio, known for his role as Biggs Darklighter in Star Wars: A New Hope. His many films include Batman, Spy Game, Me and Orson Welles and The Message. He was the rebel leader Ky in the Doctor Who serial The Mutants, and played Simon Gerrard, Debbie Aldridge's husband in the BBC's The Archers.

Director of Central Intelligence

Director of Central Intelligence

The director of central intelligence (DCI) was the head of the American Central Intelligence Agency from 1946 to 2005, acting as the principal intelligence advisor to the president of the United States and the United States National Security Council, as well as the coordinator of intelligence activities among and between the various US intelligence agencies.

Andrew Grainger

Andrew Grainger

Andrew Grainger is an English theatre and film actor. A native of the United Kingdom, Grainger moved to Castor Bay, Auckland, New Zealand in 2007, where he is active in both theatre and television productions, but continues to appear regularly on British television, as he has since launching his career.

Ho Yi

Ho Yi

Ho Yi also known as Ho Yi Wong (黃浩義) is a Chinese actor, theatre director, playwright and theatre producer of Hong Kong origin. He has lived and worked in the United Kingdom.

Benedict Wong

Benedict Wong

Benedict Wong is a British actor. He is known for his roles as Kublai Khan in Netflix's Marco Polo (2014–2016), Bruce Ng in The Martian (2015), and Wong in the Marvel Cinematic Universe since Doctor Strange (2016).

Adrian Pang

Adrian Pang

Adrian Pang Yeow Soon is a Singaporean actor, host, and contracted artiste under FLY Entertainment and prominently a full-time Mediacorp artiste from 1990 to 2010. He first came to prominence in Singaporean television by acting in English-language and Chinese-language television dramas produced by MediaCorp and SPH MediaWorks in the 1990s. Since then, he has diversified into hosting and theatre production. More recently, he had a small role in the Hollywood cybercrime movie Blackhat (2015), starring Chris Hemsworth and Wang Leehom.

Production

The film was made in Morocco between November 5, 2000, to March 19, 2001, and was originally to be directed by Mike van Diem.[4] Pitt passed on playing the title role in The Bourne Identity for this project.[5] It made its worldwide premiere at the Mann National Theatre on November 19, 2001.[6]

Soundtrack

Home video

The film was released by Universal Studios Home Video on DVD and VHS on April 9, 2002.[7]

Reception

Box office

Spy Game opened at number three behind Monsters, Inc. and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, earning $21.6 million during its opening weekend, combined with $30.6 million from its first five days.[8][9] The film grossed $62,362,785 in the United States and $143,049,560 worldwide.[3]

Critical response

Review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes gave the movie an approval rating of 66% based on 133 reviews, with an average rating of 6.2/10. The website's critical consensus reads: "The outcome of the kinetic Spy Game is never in doubt, but it is fun watching Robert Redford and Brad Pitt work."[10] Metacritic gave the film a score of 63 out of 100 based upon reviews by 29 critics.[11] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film a grade B+.[12]

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film two and a half stars out of four and said, "It is not a bad movie, mind you; it's clever and shows great control of craft, but it doesn't care, and so it's hard for us to care about."[13]

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Monsters, Inc.

Monsters, Inc.

Monsters, Inc. is a 2001 American computer-animated comedy film produced by Pixar Animation Studios for Walt Disney Pictures. Featuring the voices of John Goodman, Billy Crystal, Steve Buscemi, James Coburn, Mary Gibbs and Jennifer Tilly, the film was directed by Pete Docter from a screenplay by Andrew Stanton and Daniel Gerson. The film centers on two monsters, the hairy James P. "Sulley" Sullivan (Goodman) and his one-eyed partner and best friend Mike Wazowski (Crystal), who are employed at the titular energy-producing factory Monsters, Inc., which generates power by scaring human children. However, the monster world believes that the children are toxic, and when a little human girl Boo (Gibbs) sneaks into the factory, she must be returned home before it is too late.

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (film)

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (film)

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone is a 2001 fantasy film directed by Chris Columbus and produced by David Heyman, from a screenplay by Steve Kloves, based on the 1997 novel of the same name by J. K. Rowling. It is the first instalment in the Harry Potter film series. The film stars Daniel Radcliffe as Harry Potter, with Rupert Grint as Ron Weasley, and Emma Watson as Hermione Granger. Its story follows Harry's first year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry as he discovers that he is a famous wizard and begins his formal wizarding education.

Rotten Tomatoes

Rotten Tomatoes

Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang. Although the name "Rotten Tomatoes" connects to the practice of audiences throwing rotten tomatoes in disapproval of a poor stage performance, the original inspiration comes from a scene featuring tomatoes in the Canadian film Léolo (1992).

Metacritic

Metacritic

Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged. Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc Doyle, and Julie Doyle Roberts in 1999, and is owned by Fandom, Inc. as of 2023.

CinemaScore

CinemaScore

CinemaScore is a market research firm based in Las Vegas. It surveys film audiences to rate their viewing experiences with letter grades, reports the results, and forecasts box office receipts based on the data.

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert

Roger Joseph Ebert was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert became the first film critic to win the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism. Neil Steinberg of the Chicago Sun-Times said Ebert "was without question the nation's most prominent and influential film critic," and Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times called him "the best-known film critic in America."

Chicago Sun-Times

Chicago Sun-Times

The Chicago Sun-Times is a daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has the second largest circulation among Chicago newspapers, after the Chicago Tribune. The modern paper grew out of the 1948 merger of the Chicago Sun and the Chicago Daily Times. Journalists at the paper have received eight Pulitzer prizes, mostly in the 1970s; one recipient was film critic Roger Ebert (1975), who worked at the paper from 1967 until his death in 2013. Long owned by the Marshall Field family, since the 1980s ownership of the paper has changed hands numerous times, including twice in the late 2010s.

Source: "Spy Game", Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, (2023, January 19th), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spy_Game.

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References
  1. ^ a b c "Spy Game". American Film Institute. Retrieved October 26, 2016.
  2. ^ a b "Spy Game (2001)". British Film Institute (BFI).
  3. ^ a b "Spy Game (2001)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved December 20, 2009.
  4. ^ Hasselhoff gets to just be himself in 'Dieter': [All Edition] Milwaukee Journal Sentinel; Milwaukee, Wis. [Milwaukee, Wis]21 May 2000: 035E.
  5. ^ "DAMON IN LINE TO PLAY BOURNE": [Broward Metro Edition] Reuters. Sun Sentinel; Fort Lauderdale [Fort Lauderdale] 30 June 2000: 17.
  6. ^ "Universal Pictures Celebrates World Premiere of 'Spy Game' - Update". PR Newswire. November 13, 2001. Archived from the original on November 24, 2001. Retrieved June 26, 2019 – via Yahoo! Finance.
  7. ^ Rivero, Enrique (February 20, 2002). "UPDATE: Spy Game DVD Features Clandestine OPS". hive4media.com. Archived from the original on March 5, 2002. Retrieved September 10, 2019.
  8. ^ "'Harry Potter' keeps its lead over Thanksgiving weekend". Daily Record. November 27, 2001. p. 33. Archived from the original on September 6, 2022. Retrieved September 6, 2022 – via Newspapers.com. open access
  9. ^ "Weekend Box Office: November 23-25, 2001". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved May 16, 2015.
  10. ^ "Spy Game (2001)". Rotten Tomatoes. Fandango Media. Retrieved March 6, 2018.
  11. ^ "Spy Game Reviews". Metacritic. CBS Interactive. Retrieved March 6, 2018.
  12. ^ "Cinemascore :: Movie Title Search". www.cinemascore.com. Archived from the original on 2018-02-06.
  13. ^ Ebert, Roger (November 27, 2001). "Spy Game". Chicago Sun-Times. Retrieved October 24, 2021.
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